Recent reviews by Harry

Do not buy this game if you like strategy games. It will ruin your life. You will no longer have a life, and you can't enjoy other games anymore--realizing how many faults and design mistakes they have in comparison.

Did I mention this game has amazing mods and can be easily modded?

82 hours in the past two weeks. 800 hours over the last few months.

You have been warned.

New nation, more scenarios, what more can you ask for?

Great expansion, lots of content, well worth the very low price!

Given it's fresh out of the gate, I was going to hold off on anything negative and give Devs a chance to fix this mess, but then a dev note is released to focus only on bugs and makes no acknowledgement of the numerous design flaws that completely ruin the game experience. So here it goes:

Great ideas, great potential....but then again, the same can be said for so, many, other, games. (At the Gate, Civ 5 Beyond Earth, or just about every other indie title).

But Amplitude is no indie. They should know what they are doing and...what a mess. Constant Civ-switching leaves you with no sense of identity or attachment. Combat is tedious and dare I say, straightforward. WORST OF ALL, the balance is non-existent. So many mechanics are designed to be compound exponentially, so when the winner snowballs, they REALLY snowball. I hit classical age behind the curve on Empire difficulty setting (You know, "seriously difficult"). Then engine kicked off, and I reached Medieval age in a dozen turns, and next thing I know, I'm in contemporary era at 1000 BC fighting cavemen.

Fun fact: did you know you can hire a HOARD of independent troops on a continent you can't even reach before ocean-sailing for just a few hundred golds, then use the same hoard to take over as many cities as your heart desires (including, of course, the very cities that rented the armies to you)? The army will pay for itself within few turns.

So if you want a fun, engaging, and balanced 4X experience, your money is MUCH better spent playing Old World (by Mohawk Games) or GalCiv or CK3 or Slipways, whichever flavor you might prefer.